Selected posts

A selection of the more substantive posts I’ve written, without the filler material.

Feminism and women in math:

• Gender, conferences, conversations and confrontations (March 2015)
• On proof and progress in feminism (November 2014)
• Diversity and mathematics (October 2014)
• Maryam Mirzakhani makes history (August 2014)
• G.H. Hardy and Mrs. Ellis (April 2014)
• Gender Bias 102 For Mathematicians: Merit (August 2013)
• Gender Bias 101 For Mathematicians (February 2013)
• Still not on Math Overflow (December 2012)
• The perils of changing the subject (October 2012)
• Biased (September 2012)
• Women in math, and the overhaul of the publishing system (February 2012)
• Why I’m not on MathOverflow (March 2011)
• Truth, images and consequences (September 2010)
• ToneCheck for women (August 2010)
• An entirely positive approach. Or something. (June 2010)
• Not good with breathing, either (April 2010)
• Not good with numbers (February 2010)
• Right back at ya (November 2009)
• Gender dependent (September 2009)
• On stereotyping (August 2008)
• The 99th percentile (August 2008)
• Wishing away the glass ceiling (July 2008)
• Their own wisdom (June 2008)
• Women in Math, or Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves (December 2007)

Mathematics (general):

• Would a mathematician pass the Turing test? (June 2014)
• More on commenting and the publishing reform (February 2013)
• On commenting, conversations, and epijournals (January 2013)
• Too innumerate (July 2012)
• Teaching load, itemized: part 2 (May 2012)
• Teaching load, itemized: part 1 (April 2012)
• A brief guide to a full professor’s administrative work (January 2012)
• The state of the profession (January 2012)
• Random thoughts on publishing and the internet (November 2011)
• Math < reality. (February 2011)
• The mysterious effectiveness of trivial pursuits (September 2010)
• The girl who played with Fermat’s theorem (August 2010)
• What if mathematicians wrote travel articles? (June 2010)
• More on mathematics and madness (June 2010)
• Putnam (November 2009)
• Therein lies madness (October 2009)
• La Sagrada Familia and the hyperbolic paraboloid (June 2009)
• Blaming the mathematician (December 2008)

Mathematics (research):

• ICM paper: Harmonic analysis on fractal sets (May 2014)
• Finite configurations in sparse sets (July 2013)
• Visibility of unrectifiable planar sets (June 2013)
• An expository paper on the Favard length problem (December 2012)
• A Knapp example for Salem sets on the line (November 2012)
• Buffon’s needles: a very short expository note (March 2012)
• An update on differentiation theorems (July 2009)
• Maximal estimates and differentiation theorems for sparse sets (May 2009)
• Bourgain’s circular maximal theorem: an exposition (May 2009)
• Density and differentiation theorems for sparse sets” (May 2009)
• The Piatetski-Shapiro theorem (March 2009)
• Growth, expanders, and the sum-product problem (a guest post by Harald Helfgott; December 2008)
• The sum-product problem (June 2008)
• The Kakeya problem in finite fields (March 2008)

History:

• The weight of dead symbols (June 2015)
• The less complicated narratives (January 2015)
• Eternal sunshine of the progressive mind (April 2014)
• Obedience training (March 2014)
• St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, dogma and mathematics (February 2014)
• The complexities of communism (December 2013)
• Paint it red (November 2009)

Culture:

• Art in the life of mathematicians (August 2014)
• Art like science (July 2013)
• My four languages (April 2012)
• Waiting for the tiger teacher? (January 2011)
• Small expectations (December 2010)
• Lillian Alling and the immigrant experience (October 2010)
• Sucking at everything else (August 2010)
• The geek factor (April 2010)
• When the truth is gone… (A Serious Man; March 2010)
• The beautiful losers of Avatar (January 2010)
• Moon (July 2009)
• Being there, going nowhere (September 2008)

Academic life:

• The limits of writing for free (April 2013)
• Intellectual property at UBC (October 2012)
• The varsity sports and the musical instruments (December 2010)
• I’m on ur payroll, sipping ur sherry (September 2009)
• Conferences, peer review, and political interference (June 2009)
• Best of the best? (January 2009)
• Freedom’s just another word to flap around (February 2008)
• B is for Breadth – or Burden? (February 2008)
• The trouble with candidacy exams (January 2008)

Research politics and research funding:

• Steve Jobs on curiosity and intuition (November 2012)
• LRP update (May 2012)
• PIMS Collaborative Research Groups (May 2011)
• Submission to the LRP steering committee (May 2011)
• NSERC peer review system: broken and unreliable (April 2011)
• It’s 2 am, where is my long-term strategy? (October 2010)
• Addendum on “priority areas” (July 2010)
• Letter to NSERC: Canadian mathematics does not need “priority areas” (July 2010)
• Would NSERC have paid for developing the laser? (March 2010)
• NSERC Discovery Grants: cut back again (May 2009)
• Don’t stop believin’ (March 2009)
• Stephen Harper: not good for science, not good for Canada (February 2009)
• Broken or not, fix it anyway? (November 2008)
• NSERC Discovery Grants: how we spend the money (September 2008)
• NSERC Discovery Grants: various updates (July 2008)
• NSERC Discovery Grants, on a tight budget (about the 2006-07 budget cuts; May 2008)
• The NSERC Discovery Grants program, evaluated (May 2008)